"Our fans are pretty good. They don't give away too much. Sometimes people love dropping spoilers, but our fans are good. They tend to do it in such a way that doesn't ruin it for fans who don't want to know."--Phil Keoghan

Caviar, absolute Yum. But I did hear the season 5 caviar was NOT nice caviar.

Logged

"Our fans are pretty good. They don't give away too much. Sometimes people love dropping spoilers, but our fans are good. They tend to do it in such a way that doesn't ruin it for fans who don't want to know."--Phil Keoghan

And while we're on the subject of gross eating roadblocks, I'm mentioning the one with the spicy soup from season 6. I like spicy food and all, but it looked to me like the chefs OD'd on the paprika, which was most likely the reason so many teams were getting sick...although it did give us a few good quotes

There will be two more NEL's to meet the limits. May 6th is a two hour two episode show, that's what is confusing you I think. The show airs all night but April 1.

The double show for the finale wasn't so confusing as was exactly how they would still have four teams in the running at the start of the finale night show.

It would seem to have to be two more NELs, but that struck me as excessive since that would make two of the four remaining legs before finale night NELs. Is it normal to have NELs more frequently towards the end like that?

Season 13/14 were about the only seasons with 11 legs/episodes because of CBS spring scheduling issues.Since 14, the show has become set at 12 legs (or equivalent if there's a double leg in there,) 12 hours, 12 episodes (and one being 2 hours when necessary for scheduling.)The other thing is that the show has figured out how to do two legs in one city which they've done regularly and which reduces costs and still allows that additional hour.

Since 14, the show has become set at 12 legs (or equivalent if there's a double leg in there,) 12 hours, 12 episodes (and one being 2 hours when necessary for scheduling.)The other thing is that the show has figured out how to do two legs in one city which they've done regularly and which reduces costs and still allows that additional hour.

I am sorry, the schnauzers, but my research does not substantiate your thesis that the show does two legs in one city. I believe that there are no examples of that since AR14. In AR13, Moscow was such an example and in AR14 Beijing was too. However, since then here are the examples of ttwo legs/one country:

Since 14, the show has become set at 12 legs (or equivalent if there's a double leg in there,) 12 hours, 12 episodes (and one being 2 hours when necessary for scheduling.)The other thing is that the show has figured out how to do two legs in one city which they've done regularly and which reduces costs and still allows that additional hour.

I am sorry, the schnauzers, but my research does not substantiate your thesis that the show does two legs in one city. I believe that there are no examples of that since AR14. In AR13, Moscow was such an example and in AR14 Beijing was too. However, since then here are the examples of ttwo legs/one country:

Since 14, the show has become set at 12 legs (or equivalent if there's a double leg in there,) 12 hours, 12 episodes (and one being 2 hours when necessary for scheduling.)The other thing is that the show has figured out how to do two legs in one city which they've done regularly and which reduces costs and still allows that additional hour.

I am sorry, the schnauzers, but my research does not substantiate your thesis that the show does two legs in one city. I believe that there are no examples of that since AR14. In AR13, Moscow was such an example and in AR14 Beijing was too. However, since then here are the examples of ttwo legs/one country:

Since 14, the show has become set at 12 legs (or equivalent if there's a double leg in there,) 12 hours, 12 episodes (and one being 2 hours when necessary for scheduling.)The other thing is that the show has figured out how to do two legs in one city which they've done regularly and which reduces costs and still allows that additional hour.

I am sorry, the schnauzers, but my research does not substantiate your thesis that the show does two legs in one city. I believe that there are no examples of that since AR14. In AR13, Moscow was such an example and in AR14 Beijing was too. However, since then here are the examples of two legs/one country:

TAR 16 two legs in Shanghai, TAR 18 two legs in Zermatt and TAR 19 two legs in Brussels.

OK,I find that St. Petersburg, while not 2 full legs does qualify for close enough to 2. Shanghai has no qualifications; it clearly had 2 legs in the same city.

However, Zermatt only had slightly more than one leg; it does not qualify as 2 legs in my judgment. Brussels does not qualify either. If has small pieces of 2 legs wrapped around 1 full leg. I count that as 1 leg.

So, kudos to Alaneveda for adding to the knowledge base and TARFANSurvivor for also adding to it. There are 5 valid examples of 2 places/1 country/2 legs versus 2 for 1 place/2 legs.

Brussels does not qualify either. If has small pieces of 2 legs wrapped around 1 full leg. I count that as 1 leg.

Semantics and Hamburg drive-by aside, you have a leg and a half in the Copenhagen area, and a leg and a half in the Brussels area (and two Pit Stops in Brussels proper). Either way, you pretty much lose a location in the middle.

And what is the justification for those drive-by visits, anyway? Haven't had any in years, and all of a sudden there are FOUR in Central Europe (Salzburg/Liechtenstein/Zermatt, Copenhagen/Hamburg/Brussels, Brussels/Amsterdam/Panama City, Turin/Ehrwald/Bavaria) in three seasons? It can't be a lack of air routes - as we saw in TAR Australia, Brussels has a perfectly capable airport of its own. Is it just a way of artificially inflating the country count?

addie

Brussels does not qualify either. If has small pieces of 2 legs wrapped around 1 full leg. I count that as 1 leg.

Semantics and Hamburg drive-by aside, you have a leg and a half in the Copenhagen area, and a leg and a half in the Brussels area (and two Pit Stops in Brussels proper). Either way, you pretty much lose a location in the middle.

And what is the justification for those drive-by visits, anyway? Haven't had any in years, and all of a sudden there are FOUR in Central Europe (Salzburg/Liechtenstein/Zermatt, Copenhagen/Hamburg/Brussels, Brussels/Amsterdam/Panama City, Turin/Ehrwald/Bavaria) in three seasons? It can't be a lack of air routes - as we saw in TAR Australia, Brussels has a perfectly capable airport of its own. Is it just a way of artificially inflating the country count?

The cities in the second Brussels leg aren't in Brussels itself. If you call them Brussels Area then you can call whole Belgium Brussels Area.

I suspect it helps 'manage' the racers on a somewhat stable timeline; we don't know how teams would manage had they driven from Turin to Fussen, or flown directly from Brussels to Panama City (though I think in this specific case there was a direct flight from Schipol to Panama that was utilized). Any sort of fringe benefits (extra visas to confuse the racers, paranoia that there's more things they have to remember, more downtime for racers to bond or bicker) are unintentional.

Just a quick comment in all of the speculation. Tasks are not changed at the last moment to favor teams; the elimination points are not changed, i.e., a non-elimination leg remains a non-elimination leg. I don't know if it is still being done, but in the early seasons, it was mentioned that production actually prepared a sworn affidavit, prior to the start of filming,of the tasks that would be used and at what point so as to avoid claims that tasks were changed on the spot to favor any team.The affidavit, as I understood what was mentioned at the time, also included the backup tasks or legs in case of problems at any point in the race. There's absolutely no way a last minute change in location or tasks can be made without some advance preparation (local production crew and extras) so it can be executed and keep filming on track.It irritates me to no end when there's a suggestion such as changing a task or an elimination point to favor keeping a particular team in the race. Among other things, since TAR is legally considered under US law to be a game show, it is required to comply with federal law that prohibits manipulation of the game elements to favor or not favor particular teams.

I basically agree with theschnauzers. However, there is one huge counter-example, the changing of the pit stop for AR All Stars episode 6 from what we believe to be Arusha back to StoneTown on Zanzibar Island due to the major disruption of flights into Dar-Es-Salaam. There is little question that this was done. It may have been part of a backup plan or it may have been improvised on the fly.

IIRC, the ultimate pit stop for that disrupted leg of TARAS was an alternate task or route marker point. I recall Phil saying something along the lines, after that leg aired, that they had to pack the original pit stop and go back to that location that ended up being used. I'm not sure if the teams were told in a clue or not because, as we learned by that point the sound editors could very precisely edit the audio track to create new sentences out of unrelated sentences at different times and from different places.My guess would be that the plans had alternate pit stops listed to cover all contingencies. (Don't forget TAR 19 in Thailand where the pit stop of the second leg and a task that led to it were the only tasks in Bangkok, everything else was in Phuket.

"Our fans are pretty good. They don't give away too much. Sometimes people love dropping spoilers, but our fans are good. They tend to do it in such a way that doesn't ruin it for fans who don't want to know."--Phil Keoghan

Also, the original To Be Continued was created on the fly because the producers hadn't done their research and scheduled a NEL during a 'take all your money as a penalty' season in a country where it was illegal for the last Racers to turn around and beg in the streets for cab money to get to the airport.

They can't adjust the Book in order to favor a team they think will be popular. But they've got a lot more leeway in terms of adjusting on the fly than a show filmed on a nice controlled sound stage because Stuff Happens, and they've got a history of adjusting things if a Racer is impacted by an error caused by Production, even if they don't announce time credits like they used to. They also omitted a Speed Bump that Vicki & Nick should have faced a few seasons ago because of some sort of snafu during what seemed to be an impossibly hard music task in, IIRC, Russia.

(There's some speculation that the production issue as bad enough that Vicki & Nick's non-elimination was unplanned, but production claimed it was a scheduled NEL.)

And I'm sure that production has also regularly thrown up hours of operation signs on the fly in order to prevent teams from ending up spread over three different continents. Again with the TARAS where Charla and Mirna got a day ahead of everyone in Africa because of the Great School Holidays and Hadj mess, went to take their boat to the next task, and instead came across a sign saying the boat couldn't operate that day due to high seas that looked a good 3-5 inches of fierce waves.